


Interpretation is Relative

by RisuAlto



Category: Pillars of Eternity
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, And mad about it, Bad Decisions, F/M, Panic Attack-like symptoms, Social Media, The Watcher is still a Watcher though, art included, it's literally everyone but maneha and pallegina, locked in a closet, mentions of abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-18
Updated: 2019-11-18
Packaged: 2021-02-12 17:07:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,717
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21479857
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RisuAlto/pseuds/RisuAlto
Summary: Saying that this all started with Dyrdhára overreacting was an understatement.  She just didn’t think her friends would go this far to expose a ridiculous crush, and she really didn’t think they would have gotten said crush involved.  But here they were.  Frankly, everyone involved should have known better.
Relationships: Aloth Corfiser/The Watcher
Kudos: 9
Collections: Pillars of Eternity Prompts Weekly





	Interpretation is Relative

**Author's Note:**

> For prompt #0012, "Modern AU."
> 
> Dyrdhára’s name is pronounced “deerd-THAUW-rah,” and she’s more or less a cross between my friend [Miles’s](https://milesartblog.tumblr.com) Watcher Falon and my Watcher Tai Lon, both of whom are pale elves who romanced Aloth. Dyrdhára is far more impulsive than both of them combined, though. This was based on a ridiculous Discord conversation.
> 
> Art by Miles!

* * *

Dyrdhára should have known. She should have seen it coming. This was stupid and completely avoidable, and _she should have known_ that her friends were up to something as soon as she arrived home and saw all of them (minus Maneha and Pallegina) piled in her living room.

Durance was there, too. Even Grieving Mother had showed up. She really didn’t know how they managed those two, but she was kicking herself now for not recognizing their presence as the first of _several_ red flags.

The various occupants of Maros Heights’s fifth floor, dubbed Caed Nua by some previous tenant, were close indeed, but _this_ was still weird.

Another was when Aloth arrived after her, but she hadn’t invited him. She thought he had some exam to study for and wasn’t going to be around that day; otherwise they would have walked home together and stopped for coffee on the way. It stung a little that apparently Aloth hadn’t been _that_ busy, having answered somebody else’s invitation. To _her_ apartment. At the time, she’d been too confused (offended) to realize just how odd it was.

Dyrdhára should have _known_.

Instead of doing the smart thing and ducking out to avoid the sheer strangeness, she had stayed to ask questions. And instead of getting answers, all she got was casually and _almost_ apologetically picked up by Edér and shoved into her own front closet. Kana dropped Aloth in after her, and somebody else shut the doors on them. Dyrdhára heard the lock click and cursed herself for having dropped her bag with all her tools by the door, only to then realize that there were no handles on this side, anyway. Even someone as talented as she was couldn’t pick a lock that wasn’t there.

After making sure Aloth hadn’t landed on anything particularly hard or sharp (she didn’t _think_ there was anything in this closet besides some coats, a picnic basket, and cleaning supplies, but just in case…), she turned to the door and slammed both fists into it with a thud that would have made thunder proud. “What are you guys _doing?”_ she demanded. “What the _hell_?!”

It was Edér’s voice that answered her, sounding awfully close, like he was leaning up against the doors as well. “You can come out when you learn to kiss each other,” he said. She could hear the smile on his face and it sparked something dangerous.

_“What?_”

Dyrdhára’s screech hit a pitch she was positive she couldn’t normally make, but so did Aloth’s as they ended up yelling in unison, so she felt moderately better about it. At least they had both been blindsided by this. But that small bit of comfort didn’t stop the explosion in her chest from smoldering, choking any possibility of this being brushed off as some kind of joke. Edér _knew_ how insane her feelings were and had sworn not to tell anyone after she had accidentally let them slip a month ago. 

Sagani had been there, too, supervising the study-slash-hang-out session to give Itumaak a change of scenery. It had been normal, business-as-usual, until Dyrdhára decided that reading yet another moral shakedown of Pandgram’s career sounded about as appealing as dragging her face across concrete and picked up her phone, instead. She hadn’t _meant_ to get distracted by Instagram, but it wasn’t her fault that she had five notifications and felt compelled to clear them. And that was all it was, until suddenly she was three weeks deep into Aloth’s Instagram feed and accidentally liking one of his selfies. One that wasn’t even that cute—or impressive in any way except for how impressively _messy_ his hair was—and was, again, from three _weeks_ ago.

The noise that had escaped from her throat as she stared down at the electronic heart was so shrill that it drew Itumaak and Edér’s attention, and suddenly they were both looking over her shoulder and into the utterly mortifying mistake in her hands. 

Edér snorted. “If you’re that desperate to see Aloth’s face, ‘Dhára, I’ll just text him to come over,” he said, and Dyrdhára flinched so hard she dropped her phone.

Well. “Dropped” was an understatement. It was more like she _flung_ the phone across the room. Towards the wall with a window. Which had been open.

No one breathed for a long minute. Sagani had apparently seen the whole thing, as she was now looking up from her own phone and shifting her attention slowly between Dyrdhára and the window. Edér was uncharacteristically still behind her. And there was a furious warmth flooding Dyrdhára’s cheeks that she couldn’t even _pretend_ to hide. She wanted to curl into a ball and disappear. Part of her wanted to follow her phone out the window just to get away from the whole thing.

“That’s not gonna undo the like, Watcher,” Edér said at last, like her phone having fallen _five stories_ was a minor inconvenience.

She hunched forwards and threw her face into her hands. “Shut up!” she snapped, tumbling off the couch and onto the floor.

Sagani sighed loudly. “Well, the phone is replaceable,” she said, “and yours was getting pretty old, anyways, I s’pose. But I don’t think warranty’s going to cover it if that happens again, so, ah, go talk to him, maybe?”

“I will explode,” Dyrdhára mumbled into her arms. She couldn’t think anymore; her brain was entirely fried. She’d barely had the common sense to swear Edér and Sagani to secrecy because her entire life might spontaneously disintegrate if this ever got out.

But now, with her and Aloth locked in a _literal closet_ together, it seemed like not only was every one of her friends in on her secret, but that they wanted _Aloth_ in on it, too. There were searing hot tears clawing desperately to escape her eyes. She struggled just to take a breath that didn’t catch on the ragged edges of the metaphorical _knife in her back_.

“Edér,” said Kana, somewhere outside, “that was a little…”

“Direct?” Edér offered helpfully. _Cruel?_ Dyrdhára’s mind corrected.

“Er, yes,” said Kana.

“Oh, please,” rumbled the grating voice that could only _ever_ belong to the room’s self-proclaimed righteous man. Durance chuckled dully. “If we’d left them to their own devices, they’d have been sitting around like dumb fawns, as far apart as possible, and avoiding eye contact for hours. It was necessary.”

Dyrdhára leaned her forehead against the doors as though pushing her full body weight against _Ed__ér’s_ was going to help anything. But it did allow her to hear a soft, muted chime through the wood. The sound ordinarily soothed her, but now seemed to just twist the knife as she realized Grieving Mother was involved, too. "The heart may want what it wants,” she was saying, “but only the mind can give it a voice. And these two…“ She trailed off with a sigh, and it felt a lot like she was blowing _salty air_ into Dyrdhára’s wound.

“Wait, when’d you get here?” she heard Edér ask. And somewhere else in the room, Sagani was muttering something about Kallu and their first meeting, but it was like Dyrdhára was suddenly underwater. The voices drifted, so far away, and her body was both impossibly heavy and somehow weightless at the same time. She stumbled back from the door until her back hit the wall, and she slid down it to wrap her arms around her knees.

“I don’t—I don’t understand,” said Aloth, and Dyrdhára nearly jumped out of her skin when she realized she had entirely forgotten him in her anger. She had ended up mirroring his position, though Aloth was resting his arms on _top_ of his knees and staring at her rather than the floor. His cheeks were also full of color, and Dyrdhára felt pleasantly validated to know she wasn’t the only one who was angry.

“Are you okay?” she asked. Her voice came out rough and airy and she winced, trying to clear her throat.

Aloth hesitated for a moment, looking around as though evaluating the closet. “Yes,” he said at last. “Relatively speaking. It’s not the worst closet I’ve ever been locked in.”

Dyrdhára raised an eyebrow. “Figurative closet, or…?”

Stretching his legs out with a sigh, Aloth answered, “Well, there was one of those, too, for a while, but, ah… both?” The basket in the corner was suddenly and apparently fascinating. Dyrdhára couldn’t quite see Aloth’s eyes, couldn’t see if he was as close to tears as she had been, but the thin, soft voice he used twisted something in her chest. 

She leaned forward and pulled herself up, beginning once again to beat against the doors of the closet. “Seriously, this isn’t funny, you guys. Let us out!” she yelled, punctuating each word with a series of rattling knocks.

Maybe someone on the other floors would file a noise complaint and get them out of this.

A snicker grated against her ears like the sound of a woodpecker through the door. Dyrdhára steeled herself. Hiravias, from somewhere in the room, called out, “It’s not the door you should be banging!”

The breath in Dyrdhára’s lungs drained in an instant, and in the rush of anger that flooded her body in its wake, she nearly didn’t hear anything but her own pulse. But she did—a wet hacking sound bounced off the walls of the closet from behind her. Dyrdhára turned to see Aloth with a hand on his chest, recovering from having _literally choked_ in some combination of shock and disgust.

It made _sense_, Dyrdhára told herself. Aloth wasn’t interested in her that way, so it was no wonder he was put off by the idea. But it still hurt to have proof, no matter how irrational her own feelings were. Dyrdhára was never one to ignore her heart, but she also didn’t want to feel any _more_, not like this. 

She was about to say something else, possibly try appealing to Sagani or Grieving Mother (the reasonable ones), when there was a rush of movement at her side. A hand smacked into the wood next to her shoulder as Aloth, cheeks a brilliant shade of red and eyes glinting so blue it could kill a man, joined her in shouting at their friends.

_“Soon as ah git ma hands on ma book, Hiravias, yer a deid mon!”_ cried Iselmyr, and Dyrdhára couldn’t help but agree.

“I think _you’re_ the one who’d end up dead,” Hiravias said. “But at least this way, you’ll die as a man and not a pile of sexual tension.”

_“Fye, ye lettle—_” Iselmyr jerked one foot into the door and it shook at the impact. Dyrdhára couldn’t quite suppress a hiss in sympathy for Aloth’s toes when he came back to consciousness. 

Outside, she could hear Zahua adding something about suffering bringing clarity to the situation, but his voice was soft with amusement or indifference. It was hard to hear. Regardless, it didn’t make anything better. As Dyrdhára watched Iselmyr back away from the door to throw another punch at it (one that was likely to hurt Aloth more than the door), she shook her head frantically, hoping Iselmyr might, for _once_, try to calm down.

Calm wasn’t in Dyrdhára’s nature, either. More than anything, she wished she had her knives and that Aloth had his spells and that there was a way to just…brute _force_ their way out and forget this ever happened. The cost of burning or hacking up the door was one she’d pay gladly to get out of here. But letting Aloth get hurt because Iselmyr had the idea to punch the door down? Definitely not worth it. 

Thankfully, she didn’t need her weapons or lockpicks to flash-step, and so with a shrill demand of, “Guys, _please!_” Dyrdhára inserted herself between Iselmyr and the door, hands up over her face to herself.

“Oh—ah!” Aloth, not Iselmyr, stuttered, and the punch Dyrdhára expected to feel never came. Instead, she watched from between her arms as Aloth tried to regain his balance. Either Iselmyr had pulled back on her own or Aloth had broken through. Either way, it was a good sign, at least, that Iselmyr hadn’t seen her as _more_ of a threat, even given what their friends were implying with this whole stunt.

After several seconds of silence, Kana’s voice broke through. “I don’t think this is going how we planned,” he said slowly. There was an air of childish disappointment in his words, but Dyrdhára’s pulse was still racing in her ears and she couldn’t make much sense of it.

“Really?” said Sagani. “What tipped you off?”

“We’re doing our best!” Hiravias.

“I didn’t count on them being _quite_ this dumb.” Devil. So, she was there, too. Probably the one who checked the closet for locks.

Dyrdhára sighed and rubbed her temples. In front of her, Aloth had backed away and was slowly sinking to the ground again. He was shivering, she noticed, and she was sorely tempted to pull down one of her heavy coats and give it to him. But Aloth’s eyes were wrenched shut and his lip was held so tightly between teeth that it was as virtually colorless as her own skin—Dyrdhára recognized the signs of an Iselmyr debate when she saw one. A coat wouldn’t help with that.

“No, she _won’t_,” Aloth muttered, curling farther into himself as though he could physically contain Iselmyr. “This isn’t the manor, don’t—”

The knife in Dyrdhára’s back suddenly lanced completely through her body, tearing at her heart as it went. She—again—she _should have known_ what Aloth meant before about literal closets. Of _course,_ this was something his father thought was okay. Of course, while she was stuck in her own head and worried about being embarrassed, he was fighting against flashbacks and fear and also the second voice in his soul. As a cherry on top, Iselmyr seemed to be starting to perceive Dyrdhára as a threat, and, gods, was that the last thing she wanted. The three of them had started to understand each other, and now it was all falling apart.

(“Bah! It’ll end up being about the sex anyway.”)

None of the three them were okay, but for Aloth and Iselmyr…it was _so_ much worse.

And even though Dyrdhára’s heart was flopping on the ground like a dead fish, though there was a gaping emotional hole in her back, and though her palms stung from their first two assaults on the closet…

(“Just give it time—”)

(“They’ve _had_ time!”)

Even though she knew she didn’t have the will to use a filter anymore, Dyrdhára backed up to the closet’s rear wall, shoved her clothes out of the way, and charged with her full body into the doors.

Her shoulder impacted with a resounding thud, and the wood gave way, splintering like a sandcastle as the flimsy lock snapped in two. A few stray pieces of debris rained softly onto the carpet, and the un-shoulder-checked door creaked mournfully, hinges straining to rebound from the violent swing open.

Never, not even during final presentations, had Dyrdhára felt more eyes so completely and frighteningly focused on her. No one moved or made a sound, save for her. Her shoulders rose and fell almost ferally as she struggled for enough breath to explain herself. To scream and scold and shout _something_ that would make them understand how utterly _not okay_ any of this was—

“Yes,” she hissed. It was barely more than a whisper of breath. Her hands curled into her fists as she tried again. Riding the waves of fury and heartbreak, her voice grew with every word until she and her words were just tumbling in free-fall. “Yes, okay, _yes_, I’ve got a fucking crush on Aloth! And Iselmyr, too, if it’s fucking honesty hour, because I like _both_ of them! I like Aloth’s carefulness, and the way he pays attention to the tiniest things, and—” she glared at Edér “—his tired selfies and ridiculously neat fucking notetaking! And I like Iselmyr because she’s passionate and protective and has a really cool accent!”

In the back of the crowd, Hiravias’s head twitched in the very beginnings of a satisfied nod. Dyrdhára zeroed on him faster than a hawk, crying, “But it’s none of your guys’ _business! It never was!_ And none of it matters anyway because _they don’t like me back!_”

There were tears in her eyes, on her cheeks, soaking into the fabric of her shirt, and Dyrdhára couldn’t stay still any more. So she ran, yanking the door open with enough force that it might have wrenched her shoulder and slamming it behind her. The sound echoed in her mind as she ran past the elevators and to the stairs, legs on autopilot as she rocketed towards the ground floor. It faded to white noise as it occurred to Dyrdhára that if she hesitated for even one step, she would fall, because she didn’t have the energy to tell her legs how to run. It buzzed in her head as she stormed out of the building and to the end of the block. It pulsed in her veins as she realized that her arm was bloody, peppered with tiny splinters and flecks of off-white paint. 

It was horribly silent as she reached the park four streets down, climbed onto a bench, and cried into what was left of her once-expensive satin shirt.

She should have known better. She should have _known_.

Dyrdhára wasn’t usually the kind of person to give a fuck if strangers knew how she was feeling, but she was starting to draw stares that were a little too hair-raising to be well-intentioned. Also, her throat hurt, her head ached, and her stomach felt like a black hole. Dyrdhára figured it was time she gathered herself up and began the slow walk home. She’d taken care of _some_ of the damage to her arm, but even her deft fingers couldn’t get all the splinters out on their own, and so every twitch of muscle in her right shoulder as she walked stung like a mother. Plus, she had also barreled said shoulder into a locked door and used it to slam another behind her.

Any thoughts of maybe going to get it looked at were snuffed out as soon as she stepped into the lobby of Maros Heights. Steward’s desk was displaying her WILL RETURN sign, so Dyrdhára had expected it would be empty. Instead, she was greeted by Edér scrambling to his feet from a seat one of the (very uncomfortable) lobby couches. A scowl commandeered her features.

“Watcher—” Edér started, then winced, presumably in response to the way Dyrdhára kept walking as though he’d said nothing. “’Dhára, I’m real sorry. I didn’t mean for it to go like that. I just thought that maybe if you two—”

“Three,” Dyrdhára snapped before she could stop herself, and then immediately sighed. Now that she’d said something, there was a conversation happening, and she was part of it. Bad move. Get out. Abort. “Glad to know that not only do my _secrets_ mean nothing to you, you also just don’t hear me half the time.” Her voice was like sandpaper.

“I didn’t tell them!” Edér said, throwing his hands up. “About the selfie and the phone thing, I mean. I didn’t say anything to nobody. ‘Dhára, I swear, I didn’t do that. Sagani and I’re still the only ones who know.”

Dyrdhára put one hand on her hip. “So it’s just a coincidence that literally _everyone_ except Maneha and Pallegina decided to help you fuck me over and scare the shit out of Aloth,” she said skeptically. “Sure.”

“Yes,” Edér said with a trace of relief. Dyrdhára raised an eyebrow and he backpedaled. “Well, I mean, no, it wasn’t a coincidence. We just all were talking the other day about Iselmyr keeps, uh, checking you out every time you turn around. And then Sagani said it wasn’t just Iselmyr, and Hiravias said he was sick and tired of you both pretending that catchin’ feelings is like catchin’ the plague, and it just… it just sort of went from there.”

“Oh.” A few breaths filled the silence. “I mean you’re all delusional, and it sure as hell doesn’t make manhandling Aloth into a locked closet okay—”

“We apologized to him, too, I promise.”

“But it’s good to know you didn’t stab me in the back,” Dyrdhára finished. “More just kind of… sabotaged my friendship with my favorite people and made me _think_ you stabbed me in the back.”

Edér rubbed his neck. “We didn’t mean to! I really am sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to make either of you cry.”

Dyrdhára’s breath hitched at the words—she didn’t want to think about how upset Aloth must have been, but it wasn’t like there was anything _she_ could’ve done to make it better. Even though it hurt to have proof of how hurt _Aloth_ was, and a part of Dyrdhára wanted to shout some more, she was exhausted. Everything hurt. So instead, she just sighed and said, “Okay.” 

It wasn’t forgiveness, yet. But Edér still sagged with relief. 

Suddenly, he straightened back up, one hand reaching out. “Oh, shit, your…” 

Following his gaze down to her arm, Dyrdhára bit her lip. “Yeah, I’m gonna need my first aid stuff,” she said.

“Let me take care of it,” Edér offered, and his blue eyes shimmered like a puppy’s. “Please?”

Dyrdhára nodded and followed him towards the elevators. Through the whole ride and then the walk to his door, Edér seemed to shift his hands and stance constantly, as though he couldn’t quite figure out how to just _stand_. It drew a small smile onto Dyrdhára’s lips. She’d reassure him later, when there wasn’t so much smoke lingering inside her from the anger.

Edér’s hands were big and not exactly what Dyrdhára would call graceful, but as she sat on his kitchen table and let him work at her arm with a pair of tweezers, he showed a surprising amount of dexterity. The splinters, even the ones that had nearly disappeared under her skin, were gone in just shy of twenty minutes. Her arm was washed in alcohol and bandaged in another four, and she was out the door after knocking her friend (gently) upside the head in a grand total of twenty-five.

As she walked down the hallway to her own apartment, though, the tiny sprouts of a better mood gradually wilted as she became aware of someone else inside. Even before she unlocked and cracked the door enough to hear some shuffling, she knew to expect company in the form of the person she _least_ wanted to see right now.

Dyrdhára was surprised to see that the mess of wood near her front door had been cleaned. The door she had broken was taped up and was leaning against its frame in an approximation of its proper function. There was a folded note left on her couch with “SORRY” scrawled on the front, and as Dyrdhára peeked at her phone, she saw she had several messages unread.

She didn’t have much time to dwell on them, however, when Aloth stepped around the corner, smoothing down his sweater. He saw her and immediately froze, fingers bunching in the soft fabric near his waist.

“I didn’t think you’d stick around,” Dyrdhára admitted after a moment, looking away.

Aloth coughed slightly. “Yes, well, it’s been brought to my attention that we might…need to talk about some things,” he said, clasping his hands together and wringing them absently.

A heaviness set in, and Dyrdhára took a deep breath to keep herself afloat before moving to perch on the arm of the couch. “Right,” she said at last, drumming her fingers against the fake leather. “Look…” _I’m sorry? _She wasn’t. _We can still be friends?_ Not without a horrible helping of awkwardness. _I just said it to make them stop?_ As cruel as it was untrue. 

Nothing felt right, and the thought trailed off. Aloth redirected it. “Sagani said you thought I’d been avoiding you because you liked one of my old selfies,” he said. It was true, but Dyrdhára didn’t know what to say, so instead she just glanced up to show she heard him. Aloth wasn’t looking at her, though; his eyes were fixed on the closet, churning through emotions with dizzying fierceness. “I wasn’t.”

“Really.” Dyrdhára was pretty sure that purposefully making sure he was busy or studying every time their friends did anything and avoiding his usual routes on campus so they wouldn’t cross paths counted as “avoidance,” but who was she to judge?

Aloth sighed and reached up to run his fingers through the ends of his hair that weren’t held back. “That is, I _was_ avoiding you,” he said quickly, “but it wasn’t because you made me uncomfortable! It was because I was afraid I might make _you_ uncomfortable.”

Dyrdhára blinked. “What?”

“When you liked the picture, I thought you were making fun of me,” Aloth said, and Dyrdhára sat up straighter, leaning forwards to correct him so quickly she nearly lost her balance. Aloth didn’t give her the chance to speak. “I looked awful. It was a ridiculous photo that I only took to satisfy Kana so we could get back to studying—” he sighed, squeezing his eyes shut for a second. “I didn’t—I don’t understand how you could possibly have thought the picture worth liking except as a joke. And it just reminded me that the way I felt about you was ridiculous, and I needed some time to myself to…get those feelings under control.”

Somewhere in his speech, the words stopped holding coherent meaning for Dyrdhára as she could only focus on the beginning, on the fact that Aloth was too self-conscious to be weirded out by what happened. “I wasn’t making fun of you,” she said quickly, getting back to her feet as though standing properly might drive the point home.

“I know that _now_,” Aloth said, but Dyrdhára still noticed the way he relaxed just slightly after hearing her. He bit his lip and sighed again, glancing at the closet. “And I’m sorry about…all of this.”

Dyrdhára reached out with both hands and squeezed Aloth’s arms in reassurance, trying _very_ hard not to let her thoughts linger on how warm and strong he was under her grip. “None of that was your fault,” she said, spinning them so she was between the closet doors and Aloth.

“If I hadn’t been so obvious, maybe they would have left us—you—alone—”

“No,” Dyrdhára said, shaking her head. “Nope. Don’t you dare try and blame yourself, Aloth, because that mess was _all_ on them. You didn’t do anything to deserve that.”

“_Aye, an’ ah’ll be sure th’ lad hears it from me, too,” _said Iselmyr, rolling her eyes. Dyrdhára loosened her hold, just in case, since she knew how Iselmyr was with anyone trying to touch Aloth, but she didn’t pull away. Instead, Iselmyr pinned her gaze on Dyrdhára’s face, focusing with a seriousness that made her heart skip a beat. _“But ah did fair aboot hit ye, Watcher, an’ ye didna deserve tha’.”_

“You were just trying to protect him,” Dyrdhára said. “I understand. I just thought that between the two of us, I was the one who could handle more rounds with the door.”

She tried for a smile, but her face froze halfway through when a hand landed on her own arm. It wasn’t clear whether Aloth or Iselmyr was the one resting their fingers just below the bandages, but their eyes were clear and bright concern and guilt.

It was Aloth who spoke. “Does it hurt?” he asked. His voice was nearly a whisper, seemingly determined to be as delicate as his hand, and Dyrdhára glanced up to realize he had leaned closer than before.

“It’s al—it’s fine,” she said, words suddenly getting stuck on her tongue. “Edér was waiting for me when I came back. He was—he fixed me up and, um, apologized…” The train of thought seemed to dissolve on her lips, scattering into something that no longer made any sense, and Dyrdhára just gave up on it. Instead she focused on the lines of Aloth’s face, scrunched in concentration as his thumb gently traced the edge of her bandage. She had never seen him get this close to one of their friends willingly, except when they all decided it was a good idea to pile into one person’s living room for some reason or another. 

But he was here, in front of her, close enough that she could feel the air between them growing steadily warmer, shifting with each breath they took. Dyrdhára could press her forehead into his chest if she only took one more step. Her skin buzzed with the tension, and she could feel her heart beating in her fingertips, but it wasn’t bad. She was pleasantly warm.

Dyrdhára was very aware of the fact that she was still holding Aloth with both hands, something just shy of a hug, as she cleared her throat and asked, “Who’s there right now?”

“Both of us,” Aloth said, and when he looked Dyrdhára in the eye, she saw wildfires burning in the blue depths that made her believe it.

She nodded. “So, um… Look, I know that I can be pretty dumb sometimes, so tell me if I’ve got this all wrong,” she said, leaning forwards as she noticed that Aloth’s cheeks _looked_ as flushed as hers felt. “But, I mean, you heard what I said…earlier…and you’re still here and trying to comfort _me_ and holding me, and I just—I’d really like to kiss you.”

Aloth froze, but there was a smile on his lips that Iselmyr rearranged into a grin. _“Good_,” she said, and tugged Dyrdhára forward.

Her last step rolled her weight onto her toes as she lifted herself into the kiss, free hand coming up to catch the side of Aloth’s neck for balance. His lips were rough, likely from being bitten, but they were warm and gentle, and she was being held like neither Aloth or Iselmyr could dream of being anywhere else.

With her eyes closed, Dyrdhára had to rely on her sixth sense to know who was piloting, but to her surprise, when she reached out, she found that the soul in front of her was a near-even mix of Aloth’s soft navy and Iselmyr’s gleaming scarlet. There was no hesitation in their kiss and the embrace Dyrdhára was being wrapped in was free of the tension that usually accompanied an internal struggle for control.

They were working together. They both wanted her. Aloth, her friend and the person she most wanted to protect, _and_ Iselmyr, his other side and the enigma she wanted to understand better.

Relief flooded Dyrdhára’s veins and she leaned deeper into the kiss with a sigh. Iselmyr immediately took advantage, nipping at her bottom lip, as Aloth raised a hand to the nape of her neck, tangling his fingers carefully in her hair. Dyrdhára tilted her head to rest between the two movements and shivered at the overwhelming heat of it.

By all standards, their kiss never left the boundaries of PG-13, but Dyrdhára still found herself breathless and off-kilter as they parted for air. She blinked a few times, slowly bringing the world into focus, and found Aloth _marveling_ at her with a reverence that Dyrdhára had only seen once before It was when he and Kana had been invited to help decode the recovered grimoire of one of those really famous wizards. Minu- or Ninog- something—she couldn’t recall. Dyrdhára could hardly remember her _own_ skills at the moment.

“Wow,” she breathed once her breath came back to her, linking her hands behind Iselmyr’s neck (she knew it was Iselmyr for the sharp glint that suddenly came over Aloth’s eyes) with a soft smile on her own lips.

_“Ah tellt ‘im he was daft fur nae trying ta kiss ye b’fore, hen,” _Iselmyrsaid_._

Dyrdhára tugged Iselmyr a hair closer. “So, _you_ wanted to?” she asked.

_“Aye,”_ Iselmyr agreed, and kissed her again through their smiles. Her hands came to rest on Dyrdhára’s waist, two points of warmth that seemed to melt her from the inside out.

It was Aloth who greeted her when they parted again, though, pressing his forehead against hers. He let go of her waist and gently took her own hands in his as he murmured, “I like you, too, Dyrdhára. You’re fierce and brave and no one in the world stands up for her friends—for me—like you do. The courts back home would have been better with you in them.” He glanced away momentarily, the tips of his ears reddening as he added, “Better and more beautiful.”

Dyrdhára laughed brightly, feeling the compliments settle like sparklers inside of her. But as she took in the man before her, almost relaxed and glowing despite the dark clothes he wore and his dark hair that seemed determined to twist itself _out _of the half-ponytail Aloth had fashioned, Dyrdhára could think of nothing else to do except take his face in her hands. “You’re amazing,” she said, “and I’m so glad I don’t have to pretend anymore.”

Aloth raised an eyebrow. “Pretend?”

“That I’m not falling in love with you.” She felt a little bad for saying it so bluntly when Aloth’s cheeks lit up like flares, but he was smiling. She was so blissfully content for a few moments that it caught her off guard when her stomach suddenly panged, reminding her she hadn’t eaten since a very early lunch. “Help me make dinner?” she asked.

“Of course,” he said, passing her a hair-tie. Her normally casual, silver waves were a mess of near-curls, and she set about trying to pull them back as she led Aloth to the kitchen.

Their friends still owed them a massive apology, and there was a conversation about boundaries waiting to happen, but it still somehow seemed worth it. Dyrdhára sighed fondly. She really should have known.


End file.
